Acclaimed actress and singer Audra McDonald has won five Tony Awards and two Grammys, but for her co-starring role as Mother Abbess in tonight’s live NBC broadcast of “The Sound of Music,” she’s having to fend off some critics before the show airs. Even the hosts of the the ESPN sports talk show “Mike and Mike” were weighing in this morning. “They don’t rewrite books!” host Mike Greenberg fumed, arguing that the new production shouldn’t be performed.

McDonald, a two-time Grammy winner who has starred in such TV shows as “Private Practice” and Broadway shows like “A Raisin in the Sun,” called Speakeasy from the the Long Island set of “The Sound of Music” to discuss the show, which stars Carrie Underwood as Maria.